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Showing posts from September, 2009

Who does your coffee benefit?

So the huge controversy that everyone has been talking about recently is the new guy getting coffee. If you haven't read the news article you can check out that through the link from this...today's inspiration . I really enjoyed what the author had to say here. I mean, everyone has to get the coffee now and again, and some days, it might even be nice to OFFER...or maybe that's just me, I like to be helpful. But the point is...WHO/WHAT is this coffee helping/accomplishing. Is this because the coffee drinker is using you because you're new OR could it be because they're having a really rough morning and could use the extra minute that it would take them to walk to the kitchen for more coffee? Or even more importantly...are they helping a client or preparing for a big meeting and need to be focused on what's best for the company and truly don't have time to worry about how much cream and sugar they should be consuming. I know upon hearing about this fi

It's the [small] thought that counts

I really loved this article "It's the Small Things" that talks about how it is the little things in life that are really important to people. My Grandma was the woman who ALWAYS had a card for me on Halloween and Valentine's day, even when I thought it was silly. And then, when I started college and got those cards every few months, even if they didn't say much, it was nice to look into my mailbox and see something more than just a few flyers that I had to hang on the walls for my residents (I'm a former residence hall RA). But the author's main point was that this applies to your online life as well as offline. Always responding to emails, or sending one if you're more technologically savvy than card writing genius. And I guess in a way, that's what everyone is worried about with Gen-Y we think we're deserving of everything and more and we forget to thank and acknowledge everyone along the way, or that we're too busy creating o

You+Google=Learning

I just finished an article from the Huffington Post (you can read it here that was discussing whether or not Google was/is a miracle or a death sentence for news writers. I love Google, I think its a fantastic device (I even think the non-Google search engines are pretty great) and I'm sure that I do not want to go back to pre-Google days where I had to read information out of an out-dated encyclopedia. However, this new search engine that is being invented Wolfrom|Alpha. Granted, I'm not completely familiar with how this new device is designed to work but I have been told that it will give you everything you need to know about a topic immediately, no search results to filter through. Well my first question is: Isn't that what Wikipedia is for? And second: Isn't part of the joy of getting a question answered is getting to the answer, sometimes you need to work for it a little right? One of the fundamental skills that I learned while I was in school was

Big Brother and Your Blog

Blogging has begun to come under the legal spotlight and it could affect the blogosphere as we know it. Upon reading this article from David Spinks I have begun to wonder whether this is a good thing. I mean it could obviously be great for the improvement of blog quality with more truthful and responsible blogging but at the same time...what about the honesty of blogging. Blogs originally started as personal online journals where people could write their thoughts and ideas about the world around them. Does the policing and reading of every blog by "Big Brother" really ensure that we will get honesty from every writer out there? Spinks also mentions that higher restrictions could also lead to what he calls "less noise" as in less content and therefore less repetition and useless content. But really, what is useless content? To a Blogger your blog is NOT useless content. Everyone writes for some purpose, whether it be for informing other people, venting

Civilization's Decline

I just read this article I found on Twitter (read it here ).  It's from the Harvard Business Blog and Mr. Tom Davenport's headline reads "Are Social Media Contributing to the Decline of Civilization?" He says yes...a part of me agreed with this article and continued reading.   Mr. Davenport's main argument: a new celebrity gossip (read stalking) website called OMGICU.  He continues to say that our society has now become vapid and obsessed with celebrities and popularity and are using social media to feed this addiction.  While I agree that there are website like this (and yes the thought of them makes me shudder on the inside too) but this is not what social media is about.   I do not follow Paris Hilton or Tila Tequila on my Twitter page (I'm not even friends with them on facebook) and I still use social media daily and love it.  On Twitter I exchange information and articles (currently they are predominantly about searching and finding a job) or I se